I worked in a school district for many years in a similar role as this guy. Microsoft products are dirt cheap, if not outright free, for them. Hyper-V is an obvious migration path for them that could be done in a short amount of time.
There is also plenty of open source options available as well. Will anything be a 100% drop-in replacement with every single bell and whistle? No. Will you care in the long run? Probably not.
The article also says that their current offering is only from 2019, meaning any migration should be relatively painless without the fear of any legacy systems still running.
Not a fan of VMWare and the stunt they pulled, but to act like the world is ending (and especially to drag out the claim that kids education will be harmed) without considering any viable alternatives is a bit ridiculous.